BOOKS.

LORD CARNARVON'S "AGAMEMNON."*

• Agamemson. Translated from &saying. By the Earl of Carnarvon London: John Murray. LORD CARNARTON has more than succeeded in his effort to give such a version of Aschylus's greatest play as the English

reader, who has no knowledge of the original, may thoroughly enjoy and admire ; and though, as a matter of course, his ver- sion, like all other versions, of this wonderful play, must miss at once its full grandeur and its weird mystery, we do not doubt that his translation will obtain a very high appre- ciation from scholars, as well as from those who read only to obtain a glimpse of a work of genius any direct access to which they are denied. Lord Carnarvon knows as well as any of his critics where he falls most below the level of the original.

He says, in his preface, very justly, with relation to the choruses,—" I believe it to be simply impossible for any but a poet as great as the author of this drama himself to render them with an approach to their real force,—perhaps it may be added, that in no other language could the same ideas secure their full poetical expression at all. Independently of the obscurity of some passages, and of the poetry in other parts, which is of the highest order, there is a compression of thought within a narrow compass which defies translation in anything like an equal number of words; whilst, in addition to all other peculiarities, there is a weird and ghostly strain running through every chorus from first to last, which gives them a character of their own, and which is far beyond repro- duction or imitation." And, no doubt, this is the exact truth. The choruses in Lord Carnarvon's version are often far more of what we usually mean by lyrics than they are in the original, and most of them are fine lyrics. But they lose in stern- ness, terseness, and mystery, all, and more than all, that they gain in grace and music. It was, however, hardly possible to avoid throwing the choruses into rhymed lyrics, if only be- cause a translator must find some compensation in other direc- tions, for the untranslatable depth and concentration and weird- ness of the original. But we doubt if Lord Carnarvon has done wisely to translate the sharp recriminations of the Chorus and the vindictive self-defence of Clytemnestra in the choric song at the close of the play, into rhymed verse. Here the beauty gained is more than balanced, we think, by the strength lost, and the effect on the finely-chiselled character of the revengeful queen is, on the whole, unfortunate. Compare, for instance, the grand passage in which Clytemnestra avows and glories in her assas- sination, a passage which is translated, and very finely trans- lated, from Greek iambics into blank-verse, with some of the subsequent dialogue, which Lord Carnarvon has translated from anapaestic metres into the rhymed verse which he has adopted as the best equivalent of these metres. Nothing can be finer than the following :—

" CLYTEMNESTRA.

If oft I spoke in different strain from what I now shall speak, for this I take no shame How else could we under affection's guise, In deadly conflict with our deadly foes, Entrap them in a snare whose fatal bounds Transcend their utmost power to escape ?

Though long I waited, long I did forecast This final wrestle of an ancient fend.

The deed is done. I smote him where I stand; I smote him—yes, I scorn to lie—past cure And past escape. Round him I wrapp'd the robe With its entangling and destroying folds, Like net around the fish. I smote him twice, And with two groans he slack'd his limbs in death : Then as he lay I dealt him a third blow, As a thanksgiving to the Infernal God, The Keeper of the Dead. Thus chafing sore In rage and impotence he falls and dies ; And as in blood he gasps away his breath One drop of that black gory dew springs forth And falls upon me—with as soft a touch As heaven-sent rain upon the teeming corn.

Wherefore, ye Argive Elders, shout for joy—

If ye rejoice. I glory in the deed. And were it meet, I would libation make Over this corpse : for just it were that he Who filled our cup with curses to the brim In life, should dying drain it to the dregs."

But the chorus which follows, in which Clytemnestra takes part, and wherein, too, there are passages which, by the periodic return of certain lines, are marked as in a special sense lyrical, seems, nevertheless, to us specially ill-adapted for rhyme, at least, for that peculiar finish of effect which rhyme produces, since the clash of passion with passion, of mood with mood, is even more abrupt and marked in this chorus than in the iambic dialogue itself. Take, for instance, the following :— " CHORUS.

Would that without the pang of pain or fret of slow disease Swift death might come with endless sleep and bring unto me ease; Now that my dearest Lord and King,

Through a woman suffering,

By a woman's hand lies slain.

Insensate Helen ! thou didst once destroy Lives, many lives beneath the walls of Troy.

Alone thou didst it. Now again

Thou givest bloom and perfect life

To that immemorial strife Which once blazed high within these halls, And now upon their master falls, With doom and desolation rife.

CLYTEMNESTRA.

Seek not death to set thee free ; Blame not Helen, as though she Alone upon our host had brought Death and ruin, and had wrought Never ending misery.

CHORE'S.

Dark Fiend, whose vengeful force doth fall

On the twin line and royal hail Of ancient Tantalus—thy sway Wielded by a woman's hand, Smites like stroke of piercing brand.— See her—mark her, where he lay, Like hateful raven o'er him stand, Chaunting a foul discordant lay.

CLYTEMNESTRA.

Rightly, truly dost thou name

In thy words the cause of ill—

The ancient Demon of the race, From whom the lust of blood once came, By whom that lust is nurtured still;

For ere the old wound heals, the new one bleeds apace.

Ceoars.

In mighty strength, in deadly ire, Comes that Demon's visitation, And in sequence grim conspire Insatiate woe and desolation.

But Jove, alas ! and Jove alone This woe has caused, this deed has wrought, For amongst mortals there is nought But by Jove's will and power is done.

0 my gracious Lord and King!

How shall I bewail thy fate ?

How to thee my tribute bring, Tender and affectionate ?

In this spider's web entangled, Slain by an unholy death, By the two edged-falchion mangled, Dying thou didst yield thy breath.

Woe for thy bloody and nnhonoured tomb, Woe for thy cruel and perfidious doom.

CLYTEMNESTRA.

Think not I did the deed, or dream That I am truly what I seem : I am not Agametnnon's mate, But the fierce fiend, the avenging Fate, Atreus' cruel feast repaying, Full-grown man for children slaying, In her semblance incarnate.

" Cuoars.

Though the dread fiend that watches o'er

The ancestral curse from days of yore, Gave his aid, thou shalt not be From this guiltiness set free.

Borne upon streams of kindred blood, The God of slaughter speeds his way ; Nor shall he check his course or stay The torrent of that darkling flood, Till full vengeance he liath ta'en For those children foully slain.

0 my gracious Lord and King,

How shall I bewail thy fate ?

How to thee my tribute bring, Tender and affectionate ?

In this spider's web entangled, Slain by an unholy death, By the two-edged falchion mangled, Dying though didst yield thy breath.

Woe for thy bloody and unhonoured tomb, Woe for thy cruel and perfidious doom.

" CLYTEMNESTRA.

Yet not unworthy was his doom, Who brought this curse upon our home, And slew his child—his child and mine— The offshoot of a common line, For whom my tears shall ever flow, For whom my grief no bounds shall know.

Yes—let him go and boast below, For bloody deeds that he hath done, By death his bloody guerclon won."

That there ought to be here, as there actually is, that sort of regular rhythm, and strict correspondence in rhythm between one part and another, which is of the essence of the Greek lyric, is perfectly obvious ; but the correspondence between the parts spoken by the chorus and those spoken by Clytemnestra, being one of contrast rather than of similarity, and not only of contrast, but of sharp contrast, the rhymes which make each part complete in itself tend rather to conceal the give-and-take of the dialogue, than to bring it out. What we want is to mark the clashing between the stormy sighs of the Chorus, and the stormier recriminations of Clytemnestra to those sighs. As the old men upbraid Helen, Clytemnestra retorts that it was not Helen only who brought this misery on Greece,—that Agamemnon was as guilty of it as Helen. As the old men lament the tragic death of the King under Clytemnestra's hand, Clytemnestra recalls a greater tragedy of which this was the mere natural sequel, and she herself the mere instrument. As the old men assert her individual responsibility and guilt, Clytem- nestra retorts that by the King's share in the death of Iphigenia he had more than earned his fate. And this clash- ing of the parts of the choric song seems to us too much soft- ened and polished away by the rhyme, which keeps the atten- tion fixed on the part as if it were a whole, and hides from

you the shock between the opposing elements of the various parts of the whole. Where the choric song is all given by one speaker, and conceived in one mood, as in the earlier parts of the play,—the form of a rhymed lyric is appro- priate enough. But where, instead of connecting together a single mood of thought and feeling, it only frames in one whole the deadly conflict of mind with mind, the rhymed verse tends to give too much completeness to the subordinate elements, and to disguise the rise and fall of conflicting passions.

And this Chorus reminds us, that we cannot at all agree with Lord Carnarvon in the opinion he expresses about Clytem, nestra in the following passage of the preface :—

"She has often been compared to Lady Macbeth, and making due allowance for the necessary difference in the conception of classical and modern character, the comparison seems no unfair one. And as the only affection and loyalty in Lady Macbeth are given to her husband, so the only softness in Clytemnestra's character is reserved for Agisthus. In one passage indeed she alleges a pretext for the murder of Agamemnon in his consent to the sacrifice of their daughter Iphigeneia, at the instance of the prophet Calchas, who had declared that a virgin's blood could alone release the wind-bound fleet of the Greek heroes in the harbour of Anlis; but the pretext hardly rises in gravity to a plea of self-defence. It is rather a bitter sarcasm thrown out against her murdered husband, by one who is indifferent alike to its acceptance or rejection."

We should have said, on the contrary, that revenge for her daughter's fate is intended by lEschylus to be the leading motive of her action, and to have had far more effect upon her than any love for Agisthus. In the grand passage in which she describes the murder, the main key-note is revenge ; and revenge, of course, must be connected either with the fate of Iphigenia, on the one hand, or jealousy—of which there is but a relatively slight trace in the play—on the other. Observe the third blow which she boasts of having given, in the assassination of her husband, in thanksgiving to the Infernal god, the guardian of the dead ; observe the joy she expresses in the blood which sprinkled her, and which she compares to the dew which re- freshes the budding grain ;—these are obviously expressions of the most deadly vengeance. But equally clearly it is not Agamemnon's unfaithfulness on which she harps, though she alludes to it once, but something of mach earlier date. She is not a Lady Macbeth, committing a crime of ambition, but an. infuriated mother, committing a crime of passionate revenge And on this ground she herself puts it, when the Chorus assail her for her unnatural crime.

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air , are words of the deepest maternal passion ; "the dearest tra- vail of my womb," is not the expression /Eschylus would have put into the month of a mother who was simply finding an excuse. And again, in the choric song we have recently cited, she speaks of her with the same passion as her own much wept-for offspring. Still more striking is the savage irony of the passage,—the only passage in which, so far as we have noticed, Lord Carnarvon has missed the general tone of any speech,—in which Clytemnestra tells the Chorus that they need not fret about Agamemnon's funeral rites, since those who killed him will attend to them, and that his daughter will, of course, meet him with loving embraces in the shades below, and caress him as a daughter should caress a father :—

" CLYTEMNESTRA.

By our hand he fell and died ; Our hand shall his grave provide, Though no mourning throng attend To convoy him to his end.

Fret thee not with care like this. Him lovingly his child shall meet By the swift stream of sighs, and greet With fond embrace and tender kiss."

Lord Carnarvon may have meant this, as lEschylus certainly meant it, for bitter irony ; but he has not given it the force of the Greek, having unfortunately omitted to translate the satirical Zs xini,—" as is fitting,"—into which Clytemnestra throws the sting of her anticipation of Iphigenia's loving

welcome to the father who slew her ; and by some accident, again, Lord Carnarvon has missed the comment of the Chorus which show how they had understood the retort,—the remark, namely, that she had returned taunt for taunt. Thus he has accidentally weakened the force of this part of the evidence as to 2Eschylus's conception of Clytemnestra's maternal feeling, though in what he has given,—and given with very great power,—there is quite enough to show how profound is the vindictiveness which had sprung of maternal sufferings. To what did Lord Carnarvon, for instance, suppose that the Queen referred, when she says that,—

" Just it were that he

Who filled our cup with curses to the brim In life, should, dying, drain it to the dregs."

unless it were chiefly to the misery which the sacrifice of Iphi- genie had caused her? To our mind, there is but little trace of any overwhelming passion for lEgisthus. We should have supposed that lEschylus meant to depict Clytemnestra's love for him rather as born of disgust for her husband, than her dis- gust for her husband as born of love for him. It is she who asserts the privilege of striking the fatal blow. She will not leave to lEgisthus a revenge which is so sweet.

This heresy of Lord Carnarvon's as to the moving spring of Clytemnestra's character has, however, a very slight effect on his translation, which is full of force and dignity, as well as grace. Let us give one more specimen of a really fine work of art,—the great chorus in which, just before the entrance of Agamemnon and Cassandra, the acquisition of Helen by Troy is likened to the gift of a lion's cub to some great house where he is long fondled and caressed, until the wild strain of his nature comes out in deeds of violence and blood. Of course there is a secondary reference in all this to the transformation by which Clytemnestra is to pass suddenly from the character of the decent and dignified wife of the Argive king, into the savage lioness who avenges her child with all a wild beast's ferocity of passion :—

"CHORDS.

Who was it in the distant days,

Far beyond men's ken or gaze, Named her Helen ? and whence came The inspired prophetic name ?

Bride of the Spear and cause of strife, Fatal name to human life, Fatal name to captured town, To navies lost, to hosts o'erthrown.

Forth from her dainty bower she passed upon the seas, And spread her sail to catch the earth-born Zephyr's breeze ;

And fast like huntsmen on the track—the viewless track of oars— Her armed pursuers came to land by Simois' woody shores.

Woe for the bloody strife ! woe for the wrath divine Which brought the marriage curse on Troy and Prism's line! Claiming vengeance for the evil done to Jove, our Sovereign Lord,

Lord and ever-watchful guardian of the hospitable board—

Vengeance from her Trojan kinsmen, who, unheedful of the wrong, All too quickly, all too lightly, hymned the fatal marriage song. But Priam's ancient town in rain Learns to-day a different strain, Learns from her citizens' undoing, Guilty Paris to arraign. So once a lion's cub was reared With kindly nurture ; tame and mild, Gentle to aged man and child, Like foster-son he came at call, Fondled and loved. But goon appeared The instincts of his nature wild, A carse.nnto the friendly hall. Then his nurture ill requiting, On men and flocks in tarn alighting, Fell the ravening beast of prey. And the house was stained with blood, As when some infernal brood Of curses grow and cling and stay In some friendly man's abode.

E'en so there seemed to come on Troy The spirit of a breathless calm, A dream of beauty and of joy, Revealing in her eyes the charm Of tender grace and piercing fire, And conquering bloom of soft desire.

Fatal neighbour, cruel guest, Hapless bride, domestic pest, To the sons of Priam, she, Claiming hospitality, Came commissioned to fulfil Her marriage curse of grief and ill.

So once 'twas said in times of yore, Great happiness can never die, Or pass away like childless sire Without result or progeny ; But endless sorrows shoot and spring Out of Fortune's blossoming.' But I believe unholy deed Bears ever true and kindred seed, Whilst in the dwellings of the just arise Fair children and illustrious destinies.

But in the unrighteous home, An ancient wrong begets a worse, And, when the appointed hour shall come, That worse shall yet again beget Of its own kind, most dread in fight, Arrogant and foe to light, In the dark halls where far from sight Broods the hereditary curse.

But Justice marks the blameless lot ; She shines within the smoke-dimm'd cot, And ever as she turns her eyes From glittering gawd or golden prize, And lightly reeks of power or cause Stamped with a counterfeit applause, With an unerring aim she bends Man's fate to its appointed ends."

Though that has not, and could not have, the brooding fire of the original, it would be hard, we think, to present it in a more vigorous and impressive form.